What happens if a customer purchases an in-stock item and a pre-order item with different fulfillment dates on Shopify?

Understanding how Split Shipping in Checkout works on Shopify

When a customer purchases an in-stock item and a pre-order item with different fulfillment dates on Shopify, we called this a “mixed cart”.

There are different types of mixed cart scenarios - in this article we're focussing on the mixed cart scenario where an order has both in-stock and pre-order items.

If you've enabled the Split Shipping in Checkout feature in your Shopify's Shipping and delivery settings, your customer’s order will be split into two shipments automatically.

Instead of you paying twice for their shipping (once to ship their in-stock items and once to ship their pre-order items), your customers will now have to pay for their own additional shipping. They can choose between different shipping options for each fulfilment (e.g. Standard, Express, or Free Shipping too if you offer it for your store).

How to combine all mixed cart fulfillments to ship together on Shopify

If a customer would like to wait for their in-stock items to be shipped with their pre-order items together (to save on the additional shipping cost), you can put the in-stock item's fulfillment "On Hold" manually. Visit and edit their order in the Shopify admin, then refund the additional shipping fees they've paid for.

Alternatively, you can use Shopify Flow to automatically hold all in-stock and pre-order mixed carts fulfillments. See our step by step guide here.

You should mention this as an option on your product pages and in your order confirmation email that they should inform you ASAP after they've placed their mixed cart order. See below.

Letting your customers know they can combine all mixed cart fulfillments to ship together

You should let your customers know they can avoid paying for double shipping if they're happy to wait for their in-stock and pre-order items to be shipped together. This may help reduce abandoned carts.

You can paste the following into your Shopify product page description, and in your Pre-order/Shipping policy to let your customers know about this option (or use Early Bird's pre-order note option):

Product Page Description

If your order contains both a pre-order product and an in-stock product, we can combine them into a single shipment to save on shipping costs. By default, your mixed cart order will be shipped separately, which results in additional shipping charges. If you prefer to wait and have all items shipped together, please let us know in the 'Special Order Instructions' box at checkout or contact our Customer Support team [insert email here] immediately after placing your order."

Shipping Policy

We understand that some orders may include both pre-order and in-stock items. By default, these items will be shipped separately and result in additional shipping charges. If you'd like to combine your shipment and wait for all items to be ready, please indicate this in the 'Special Order Instructions' box at checkout or reach out to our Customer Support team [insert email here] as soon as possible. We'll be happy to hold your in-stock items and ship everything together once your pre-order items arrive.

Need help?

If you have any questions about managing split shipping for your Shopify pre-orders, feel free to connect with us on LinkedIn or email us at support@shopside.com.au to see how we can help!